


Changes

by brandytook



Category: How to Train Your Dragon (2010)
Genre: Gen, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-19
Updated: 2012-12-19
Packaged: 2017-11-21 14:13:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/598651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brandytook/pseuds/brandytook
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hiccup discovers something about Toothless that forces him to rethink what he knows about the dragon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Changes

**Author's Note:**

  * For [billtheradish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/billtheradish/gifts).



“Gobber! Come look what Toothless has done!” Hiccup yelled, charging into Gobber's hut.

Gobber jumped up from where he'd been trying to turn last night's coals back into a fire and ended up toppling backwards on to the floor. “Hiccup! A little volume control would be appreciated in the morning. Viking or no.”

“I don't know what it is!” Hiccup continued, as if Gobber hadn't spoken at all. “He might be sick! You need to come look at it.”

“What what is?”

“The thing Toothless has done. I don't know what it is!” Hiccup reiterated and ran the rest of the way into Gobber's hut so he could give him a hand up off the floor. “Follow me!” he said, still speaking at an unreasonable volume for so early in the morning, and dragged Gobber out of the hut. “I went up to where he sleeps, up there on the aerie, this morning so we could go flying together. He likes flying when the sun's rising but I got there just as this thing was coming out of him. And he looked like he was in pain. He snarled at me a little when I got close to him!” Hiccup prattled on, seemingly unaware that Gobber was keeping up his own string of muttering as well, neither one of them hearing the other. After about five minutes of this they reached the cliff top where Toothless liked to spend time when the village got too hectic and cramped.

Toothless was lying there, eyes half-lidded, curled around the thing that was causing Hiccup so much distress.

“What is it?” Hiccup asked for the hundredth time.

Gobber approached the speckled, spherical object slowly. It was about the size of his head. Toothless watched him carefully, as if prepared to pounce, but made no move to do such a thing. Gobber tapped the object once, very gently, with his prosthetic hammer hand. It made a muffled thock sort of noise.

“Hiccup, I think this is an egg.”

“What?”

“I believe Toothless laid an egg.”

“But.” Hiccup found himself at a loss for words. “But Toothless is a boy.”

“Well, maybe not,” Gobber shrugged. “Has Toothless ever given you any reason to think that?”

Again Toothless found himself stuttering. “Look at him. He's a he.”

Toothless blinked sleepily at Hiccup and yawned.

The look on Hiccup's face changed from one of befuddlement to a cross between excitement and apprehension. “Is it going to hatch?”

“I doubt that very much. Do you see any other Night Furies around that Toothless could make a hatchling with?”

“Then where did the egg come from?”

“By Odin's beard boy, the same place the chicken eggs you eat for breakfast came from.”

“Dragons aren't anything like chickens,” Hiccup protested, but it sounded weak even to his ears. He wasn't sure why he was so determined that this thing shouldn't be an egg, or if it was, that it shouldn't be Toothless' egg. But it meant he'd known Toothless for months without really knowing... her.

“I expect they're more similar than you'd imagine. Maybe we should fry this egg up and see what it tastes like.”

Toothless growled.

“Do you think she,” Hiccup stumbled on the word, “knows it's not going to hatch?”

“It doesn't look that way, does it?”

Hiccup stepped forward, and leaned his forehead against Toothless'. They stared into each other's eyes. “Hi, girl,” Hiccup murmured, trying out the words.

“I'll just leave you two to sort this out then,” Gobber said, and tromped back down the hill.

It was mid-afternoon when Astrid came running up the hill. Hiccup was sitting with his back to the egg and one arm draped over Toothless and they were facing the ocean, watching rays of sunlight play on the water.

“Toothless is a girl?” Astrid exclaimed running in front of them, standing outlined against the horizon.

“Who told you?” Hiccup realized suddenly that he didn't want anyone else to know. There was something embarrassing about all this.

“That's so cool!”

Once Astrid got close enough she began inspecting the egg. Toothless didn't even flick her eyes toward Astrid as she inspected it. Hiccup wondered if she trusted females around it more than males. Hiccup wondered if there had been other things that he'd missed pointing out Toothless' sex. He felt like he should apologize or something.

“It's pretty,” Astrid said. “Can I have it?”

“What are you going to do with it?”

“I dunno. I wonder how sturdy it is. Maybe you could make a helmet out of it.”

Hiccup twisted to look over his shoulder at the egg. It was a dark blue color, almost the same shade as the sky just after the sun sets, and it was dusted with lighter blue specks, like freckles, or stars. 

Astrid was staring at it pensively. She squinted, furrowed her brow, and bit her lower lip.

“What?” Hiccup asked.

“Well, I'm just trying to think how this changes things and I can't think of any way that it does actually. I mean, she doesn't even need a new name or anything.”

“I think that's what's bothering me,” Hiccup said. “It seems like something should be different, but everything feels the same. Well, mostly anyway.”

Toothless arched her neck and rubbed the side of her face against the top of Hiccup's head, smacking her lips.

“Do you think you could stay with the egg for a bit?” Hiccup asked. “I want to go flying, and Toothless doesn't seem to want to leave it alone even though there's not a baby inside it. I think this would all make more sense if we were in the air for a little bit.”

“Sure,” Astrid said.

The saddle was still lying off to the side where Hiccup had dropped it this morning in his distress. He went to retrieve it and held it up where Toothless could see it, his eyebrows raised in a questioning manner. Toothless looked seriously at Astrid, and then at the egg, and then back at Astrid, and Astrid grinned and nodded.

Standing slowly Toothless shook her whole body, like a dog coming out of the ocean, and then nuzzled Hiccup again as he went about strapping the saddle on to her body. It all felt the same way it had yesterday. Toothless' scales were the same texture they'd been. Her neck was the same width as it had been and the saddle sat on the curve of her spine the same way it had. Her muscles shifted the same way they had when Toothless hoisted himself onto her back and he still felt the raw power of her when they sprang into the air.

Hiccup hollered as they dove off the cliff and hurtled toward the water below, righting themselves and skimming over the crests of the waves just in time. Hiccup pressed himself close to Toothless' scales as they veered across the sky in circles and loops and shapes that had no name. They flew around Berk and back while the sun set as if nothing had changed, because really, nothing had.


End file.
